


Curiosities

by Luddleston



Category: The Witcher (TV), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types
Genre: Banter, Flirting, Fluff, M/M, Pre-Relationship, minor references to the books, witcher biology
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-16
Updated: 2020-01-16
Packaged: 2021-02-27 04:22:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,109
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22281025
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Luddleston/pseuds/Luddleston
Summary: "Geralt, let me ask you a question.""No.""Oh, come now. It's nothing ridiculous."Jaskier does his research, Geralt is tired of all the questions, and the questions get more and more personal along the way.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion
Comments: 35
Kudos: 1478





	Curiosities

**Author's Note:**

> This all came from me asking my roommate how tf witchers could get aroused if their pulse is so slow. I really didn't want to see what I came across trying to research that, so I decided to write a fic about Jaskier being nosy instead. 
> 
> Was originally supposed to be a "5 times Jaskier asks Geralt a question about being a witcher, 1 time Geralt asks Jaskier a question about being a bard" thing, but I can't count, so there's only 4 Jaskier questions.

They had been riding in relative silence for a while, Jaskier having discovered that he could not, in fact, play his lute while on horseback. At least, not if he wanted to keep up with Geralt. The quiet should have been pleasant. The sunshine, unusual for early Spring, was pleasant, as was the open countryside, the fresh air still cool enough that Geralt wasn't baking in his armor. 

The silence, though, was foreboding. 

Jaskier was never quiet. Not even while asleep, he snored and mumbled things and once, fell off his horse, which he shouldn't have been sleeping on top of in the first place. His silence meant one of two things: either he was thinking up lyrics and would start belting them loud enough to send the starlings flying from the treetops in about five seconds, or…

"Geralt, let me ask you a question." 

Or _that_ was about to happen. 

"No." 

"Oh, come now. It's nothing ridiculous." It most certainly would be. "It's just, on that last quest of ours, you were underwater so long I was sure you'd drowned. Can you breathe underwater?" 

_Can you breathe underwater?_ "No. Haven't got gills, Jaskier." 

"Then how do you stay down there so long without suffocating?" Jaskier had the look about him like he was trying to put something to song. Fuck. 

"Better lung capacity. Potions. Don't have to breathe as often. That's all there is," Geralt said, and Jaskier frowned. 

"I was going to write something very touching about a siren's kiss, but now I'm doubting the realism." As if that had ever stopped him before. "Perhaps a siren song, instead." 

"Sirens are more likely to kill you than kiss you," Geralt said, pulling Roach ahead of Jaskier's mount so that he didn't have to look him in the kicked-puppy eyes. "And they don't sing, they screech like devils." 

He couldn't see the pouting, but it came through loud and clear in Jaskier's voice, anyways. "Ruin my fun, why don't you. No matter. I'm going to write a ballad about a siren falling in love with a prince, and it's going to be lovely, you'll see." 

"People like you are why sailors keep trying to fuck sirens and getting their heads chewed off." 

"Does that really happen?" Jaskier muttered to himself, and Geralt didn't answer, because he, unlike the bard, didn't go spinning tales for the sake of others' entertainment. "Hm. Maybe I'll write a song about that, instead." 

— — — 

With a witcher's heightened senses, it was easy for Geralt to become overwhelmed, and it had taken him years of training to keep the sensory overload at bay whenever he entered a crowded room. He spent more time observing than most, noting the source of every smell or sound or flash of light, but he was a witcher, so folk afforded him a bit of staring from the corner whenever he entered a room. Jaskier said it added to his mystique. Geralt said that he had no mystique in the first place and he did not know what the hell Jaskier was going on about. 

Jaskier watched him even more closely than usual as Geralt listened to a rather drunk man tell him about a monster plaguing his tomato crop that was almost certainly a deer. The drunkard stood, left the two of them seated there, and Jaskier peered at Geralt over the rim of his tankard like he was waiting for explanation. 

"What," Geralt said to him, because while he may have been able to pick out which three women in the tavern Jaskier thought he had a chance with just from his body language, he could not read minds, and therefore had no idea what Jaskier was trying to prompt him to say.

"Why do you have a look on your face like something stinks?" Jaskier asked. 

Geralt had been told he had an unreadable face, but apparently Jaskier had been educating himself on the language of whatever Geralt's eyebrows were doing. "The shit he's drinking smells like it could strip the varnish off your lute."

"Does it?" Jaskier leaned over the table and sniffed at one of the man's three empty cups. "Whoa. Yeah. It does. Shit, I'd be that could even knock _you_ out." 

"Probably." Geralt watched as his 'potential client' slumped over the bar, distraught because the maid behind it would not let him have another. "No faster or slower than most men, though." 

"Really?" Jaskier turned sideways on the bench, throwing one of his legs over so that he straddled it facing Geralt. He rested one elbow on the table and leaned in, propping his chin on his hand. Geralt would try to explain personal space to him if he hadn't already done so a half-dozen times. One of his knees nudged against Geralt's thigh. "I thought witchers had inhuman tolerance for that sort of thing." 

"No." Geralt continued to eat, hoping that it would keep Jaskier from asking him more questions, but apparently he had no respect for a person who had food in his mouth and couldn't answer. 

"So, you're just completely ordinary in that regard. Really. Are you quite certain you're not comparing yourself to men like that one who will down three cups of paint thinner?" 

He swallowed. Took a drink. Took his time doing it. "A witcher's heart rate is exceptionally slow," he said. "I don't get less drunk than other men. I just get drunk slower." _And stay drunk much longer,_ he did not add, because then Jaskier would end up prying stories of the times he and his fellow witchers-in-training broke into the vodka and had to go through morning training blind drunk because they hadn't sobered up yet. 

"Interesting." Jaskier did not move from his place, still far too close for comfort, and Geralt had to elbow him away. 

"You had better not be planning to get me drunk," Geralt said. 

Jaskier scoffed. "How dare you accuse me of doing such a thing," he said, like it wasn't exactly what he was planning. Thankfully, it would be more of a challenge for him to get Geralt drunk than it would be for Geralt to avoid it. 

Still, he wasn't looking forward to sniffing at every drink Jaskier offered him for the next month. 

— — — 

They managed to arrive in town smack in the middle of a local festival, the kind with drinking and dancing until the sun went down and came up again in the morning. Ordinarily, Geralt would have left the village at the first sight of colorful pennants and flower crowns, but when he noticed the gleeful look on Jaskier's face, the idea of leaving gave him the same twinge of guilt he felt when he didn't let Roach eat the other half of his apple. 

And so, they stayed. 

The food was good, and the townsfolk were willing to share all of the bounties of the feast. Geralt suffered somebody pinning a flower to his cloak, a huge white daisy that made him look ridiculous. Jaskier, as his name implied, had a bunch of buttercups tucked behind his ear. Geralt snagged a drink and quickly made his way to the outskirts of the festivities, leaning against a tree and attempting to look unapproachable. 

Jaskier joined a group of local troubadours, singing and playing along to the songs he knew, dancing along to the ones he didn't. Although Geralt spent his time standing at the edge of the town square, hovering like a specter, he couldn't quite keep a smile off his face when he discovered that Jaskier was capable of singing, dancing, and playing the lute all at once. It must've taken some skill, after all, Geralt couldn't even do one of the three (except perhaps dance, and only if the footwork wasn't too dissimilar from what he used in battle). 

They danced until the moon was high in the sky and the bonfire that had been started to illuminate the town square had more logs thrown onto it by the hour. Geralt was considering retiring to the room he'd acquired for the night, letting Jaskier have his fun and whine about the hangover in the morning, but someone stopped him with a soft hand on his elbow. 

"Could I have a dance?" 

He looked down at the brave soul who'd asked and then had to look down further, because she was a tiny scrap of a girl, with flowers plaited into her long brown hair and hopeful dark eyes waiting for his answer. She couldn't have been more than fifteen. A trio of other girls around her age stood within earshot, giggling like they may have dared their friend to ask. 

"Don't ask for something you might regret," Geralt said, the words coming out more harshly than intended. The girl dropped her head, and her hands curled into the fabric of her dress. She bit her lower lip and blinked fast, like she was about to cry, and Geralt was comfortable hurting any number of people, but children were not on that list. "Meaning… I'm terrible at dancing. You wouldn't want to be stuck with me." 

Her laugh was one of relief and embarrassment. "Oh, no, I don't mind. You couldn't possibly be bad as half the town, particularly the half that's drunk all the mead." 

"Trust me. Got two left feet," Geralt said, although he was fairly coordinated. He untucked the daisy from the clasp of his cloak and tucked it into the braid woven around her head like a crown. Her friends shrieked with glee, hands pressed over their mouths, but Geralt could hear them easily. "Go dance with your friends, that'll be much more entertaining." 

She thanked him enthusiastically and disappeared as quickly as she'd come, her friends dragging her between them and linking arms with her, their chattering becoming less distinct as they moved to the other side of the fire. Geralt focused on the sound of familiar footsteps approaching from his other side. 

"Enjoying yourself?" he asked, without turning, even though the answer was clear. When Jaskier came into his field of vision he was grinning and flushed from leaping about the dance circle, trying to sing at the top of his lungs all the while. His voice would be hoarse tomorrow. 

"Aw, Geralt," he chided, "you couldn't give a pretty girl one dance?" 

Geralt shook his head. "She was a child. And I don't dance." 

Jaskier leaned against the tree beside him, sinking to the ground and kicking his legs out to rest his feet and Geralt sat next to him. He noted that at some point, Jaskier's collection of flowers had grown, and he now had a full crown of them on his head. 

"Geralt," Jaskier said, "do you not recall what it was like to be a teenager, trying to impress somebody attractive?" 

"No. I don't," he said. 

Jaskier strummed his lute, just a few nonsensical chords to fill the air while he thought. "I suppose witchers don't have that sort of childhood experience, do they?" 

"When I was her age," Geralt said, "I was completing the trials to become a full-fledged witcher." If he was especially forthcoming it was only because the light was low and distant music was soft and Jaskier felt as though he was listening not for a story, but for a facet of Geralt that he did not yet understand. "It was a dangerous undertaking for the inexperienced, although nowadays I could probably complete it in under an hour. Two of the others died. Maybe three. I can't remember."

Jaskier swore under his breath, fingers stilling on the strings. "That's… I can't even imagine," he said, suddenly serious. The mood disappeared in a breath, like the smoke from the bonfire endlessly traveling upward. "No wonder you're so damn repressed." 

"Repressed— _what?_ I'm not. Jaskier. Damn you." 

— — — 

"Geralt," Jaskier said, a ways past tipsy, the both of them crammed onto the too-small bed in the shoebox of a room they were sharing, "I've a question for you." 

"This never goes well for you," Geralt said. Jaskier was slumped against his side, as he was wont to do when drunk or tired. Geralt would have complained about it if his words wouldn't fall on deaf ears. As it were, he just put his arm around Jaskier until the physical contact proved too irritating. 

"Just. Okay. Hear me out." Jaskier sat up a bit straighter to prove that his words were important ones to listen to. "So. You're a witcher, right?" 

"If that's your question, you're much more drunk than I took you for. Yes, I'm a witcher. You've written many a song about it." 

"Shush. Stop teasing me, you know that wasn't it." Jaskier shoved him in the side and didn't manage to move him. "The question is: since you have that whole, that whole—" he gestured vaguely with his hands as if searching for the word, and did not come up with anything much, "—thing, where your heart rate is so slow, and you don't bleed as much, and… and all of it. That is true, right, you don't bleed very much?" 

"Mm. Get to the point, Jaskier." He kicked Jaskier in the ankle, because apparently they were being that childish. Jaskier kicked back. 

"So, if your blood circulation is so slow, how do you…" He continued to gesture vaguely, this time in the direction of Geralt's lap. "You know?" 

"I think you should elaborate," Geralt said, grinning as he watched Jaskier's face go even redder than the drink had made him. Jaskier, who was now immune to the horrifying sight of Geralt's smile, started sniggering and slumped back against him. 

"I'm just saying, you seem to satisfy plenty of ladies, but logically, it makes no sense." Jaskier did not add that most things probably made no sense to him in that particular moment. 

Geralt sighed, thinking. Something that would get them off this topic. Anything. "I'm a witcher, not a biologist," he said. "Why do you ask? Is yours not working?" 

"I'm _fine,_ thank you very much. And I'm noting your curiosity about that." 

"Not quite convinced. You haven't been messing around with my swords, have you?" 

Jaskier tried to shove him again, and then must have thought better of it, because he just let his hand rest against Geralt's side. "I knew that thing about touching a witcher's sword making human men impotent was bullshit," he said. "I knew it the whole time. I just played along for the joke of it. You don't understand. Your sense of humor only crawls out of its cave once per decade." 

"Should've known I couldn't fool you," Geralt said. Jaskier was drunk enough to miss the sarcasm. 

He threw his arm around Geralt's middle, wiggling closer to him, trying to steal his warmth in the chilly room. "It's just a natural curiosity, that's all," he yawned. "That's all." 

"Sure it is." 

Geralt realized that Jaskier was going to fall asleep cuddling him, and he closed his eyes, rubbing the bridge of his nose with his free hand. Ah, well. He'd weathered it before, he'd do it again

— — — 

Jaskier was whistling. Had been all morning. First it had been birdcalls, which he could replicate with uncanny accuracy, and then it had been a tune Geralt did not recognize, because Jaskier had performed alongside another bard the previous night. 

Geralt had missed the performance because he'd been waist-deep in nekkers at the time. 

He stopped midway through, shook his head, muttered, "no, that's not right," and kept going, this time with some of the notes reversed and the tune faster. His horse, Pegasus, actually seemed to like the music, and wandered along happily. Roach, Geralt well knew, did not, and she would bite Jaskier if he rode too close, so he was some distance away. 

Jaskier re-started the whole composition from the beginning, and when he finally reached the part that had been troubling him and made it through without error, he shouted a triumphant "ah-HA!" and pulled his lute from its case, playing the same tune with perfect accuracy. Geralt, having never heard the song before, couldn't determine how similar it was to what the other bard had played, but Jaskier seemed pleased with himself. 

"How do you do that?" Geralt asked, after Jaskier replaced the lute. 

"What, play the lute aboard a horse? It's taken some practice, I used to nearly fall—" 

"No, no, I remember that," Geralt said. "How do you hear somebody else play something, and then learn it without even looking at the composition on paper?" The same was not to be said for Geralt's line of work. Most of the things he knew how to kill and all of the potions he could concoct were the result of reading other witchers' books. And witchers, unsurprisingly, were not very good writers. 

Jaskier shrugged. "I studied it," he said, "for years, while at university. Among other things. History, geography—that was my favorite subject—why the look on your face, Geralt?" 

"I didn't know you studied so much." 

"Of course!" Jaskier spoke louder, as though addressing a crowd. "I graduated with all possible honors, you know!" 

Geralt rode a bit closer, so that Jaskier would stop shouting, and because now that he was done whistling, Roach would not try to nip at him. "Huh. I suppose I didn't take you for…" 

"An educated person?" Jaskier suggested.

"A very good student," Geralt corrected. 

He laughed. "That does stand to reason. I suppose I did sneak out into the women's dormitory too often to be considered a 'good student' by any measure." That sounded about right. "I am actually an intelligent person, however, surprise, surprise." 

"I know you are," said Geralt, "you're just not very wise." 

Jaskier, who still had the shadow of a black eye because he had flirted with a married woman while her husband stood three feet away, had to agree. "I suppose a wise man would not follow the trail of a monster hunter as he travels 'round the continent. That must be how wise men get so very old. They don't become dinner for a kikimora." 

"Well," Geralt said, "then I am glad you're not a very wise man. And I won't let anything eat you." As much as he could prevent that, at least. 

"I'm bringing that up next time you're angry with me because I get kidnapped by elves!" he announced. 

And oh, would he. Geralt wasn't looking forward to it. But, as Jaskier delightedly began singing Geralt his alma mater's anthem, he supposed that traveling with an unwise bard wasn't the worst situation possible.

**Author's Note:**

> I've decided to just start putting random references to things that happened in the books up in my fics about the show regardless of timeline bc what even is the witcher timeline??? Including: the thing about touching witcher swords, and geography being Jaskier's favorite subject (pls note that this is only bc the textbook was big enough to hide a bottle of vodka behind, Jaskier is very cool and deffo not a huge nerd. for sure.)
> 
> Anyway I've been reading Season of Storms and it's my duty to this fandom to make sure everyone knows they canonically share a very small bed also. IT HAPPENS. 
> 
> Visit me on tumblr/twitter @ luddlestons for more Jaskier is Very Bi facts as i re-read all these dang books


End file.
